Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

Jack Layton, here

by Aaron Wherry on Sunday, October 24, 2010 5:39pm - 0 Comments

The NDP leader is concerned you might not be able to heat your snowbound farmhouse this winter.

Ontario and British Columbia get their own regionally specific graphics. All will apparently start appearing on television tomorrow.

Tags: harmonized sales tax, hst, Jack Layton, NDP, tax, taxation

More by Aaron Wherry

bork

The NDP have the right motives but the wrong plan.

Making energy costs (heating) cheaper will increase consumption. If you want to make heating more affordable to those who are badly off, but don't want to encourage wasteful consumption, keep the prices high and provide direct cash transfers to the poor. That way, the poor can afford to heat their homes, but are still motivated to conserve energy (because a dollar saved on energy is a dollar in their pockets).

catherine

What are the NDP's motives? With Layton, I've concluded that they don't understand economic policy or they don't care about GHGs. Not sure which.

Anyway, I agree with your proposal.
http://accidentaldeliberations.blogspot.com The Jurist

If only any of the people who keep talking about "cash transfers to the poor" in response to universal proposals would actually make half the effort to actually push that as a policy idea, the NDP might well be doing just that. But as far as I can tell, it tends to serve more as alternative presented as an excuse to do nothing.

Dot

The G&M article highlights the NDP startegy:

The ads will run across the country, but more often in areas where home heating costs have gone through the roof and where the party is hoping to pick up Conservative-held seats in the next election, says Brad Lavigne, national director of the federal NDP. Those regions includes Vancouver Island, Northern B.C and the interior, Saskatchewan, southern Manitoba, northern Ontario and Atlantic Canada.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ndp-…

A much more effective strategy for these areas would be to ask for tax relief for diesel or home heating oil (prices up) in remote areas that don't have access to nat gas (whose prices are low) or cheap electricity.

Mike T.

As discussed in an earlier but similar topic, I prefer a system whereby everybody gets a perferential rate on a certain amount of electricity and a higher rate after that, with different categories of a user.

Dot

That's rate making – prov jurisdiction.

Mike T.

That is an interesting point, although the two levels could work together to put something in place, or the Feds could find a way to work around it.

Dot

Not how it works. Each utility applies to its regulatory agency based upon its costs to deliver to households. Drop this line – not fruitful.
Mike T.

You underestimate the flexibility of the spending power. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!
Jan

The rate and the tax – two different things.

catherine

That would get around the problem with Layton's proposal. His plan would appear to give the largest break to people who own drafty McMansions and long heated driveways.
kcm

Stop making sense MT. Don't you know it's much easier to reduce taxes – no matter how incoherent the policy – Is Layton stealing ideas from Harper these days.

kcm

Hmmm, i like this idea; but on consideration wouldn't it be very complicated to impliment/enforce? Perhaps cash transfers to those who need them might be simpler…or would that be equally complicated?
Orson Bean

What's that saying about imitation being the sincerest form of flattery? Iggy (re the Home Care proposal) and Layton, with this, are both doing classic retail politics. Just like Stephen Harper.

tobyornotoby

"but are still motivated to conserve energy"

If we believe all the poor own their own farmhouses, that might be a useful observation, but they are much more likely to be paying a heating bill on a older home that they rent in a city or small town. And, given the landlord doesn't pay the utility bill, said landlord has little interest in insulating, energy efficient furnaces, or new windows.

So, the tenant might have a motivation, but not the means to addresss the main drivers of heat costs and greenhouse gas emissions. Maybe all the smart people who are so sure the NDP doesn't know what it's doing, could address that issue. How is punishing the poor with high fuel costs going to assist with conservation? And, how are economic disincentives going to reach the thousands of small landlords who control older building stock but aren't interested in retrofitting because they have a business model that externalizes the cost?

kcm

Good points…i've certainly been there – a landlord that didn't give jack squat about my heating bill, and no way to pressure her – other than persuasion or moving out [ not an option in my town. And only effective if the vancany rate is high] or buying – which we subsequently did. Of course you could argue that some would do as i did [buy]. It would be interesting to know if the price is allowed to creep upward whether enough people would put pressure on landlords to retro fit or risk lossing their best tenants. The answer would seem to be effective Financial incentives to retro fit, this would help to create a market for disgruntled renters. But i'm not sure if you don't undercut that by holding down costs for the working poor. The truly poor as always are pretty screwed as you point out.

Dot

Dishonest.

The Ontario ad talks about "Stephen Harper's HST"(and shows a graphic of 8% increase which is alton McGuinty's Ont provincial tax) then talks about dropping Fed tax of 5% (previously GST which already existed on heatiing).

Booo!!!!

RayK

As part of Stephen Harper's push to get the provinces to adopt the HST, Dalton McGuinty and Gordon Campbell did. That caused the price of home heating and utilities to go up 7 to 8%. Now–since it's not as if the federal government can realistically reverse harmonization without the support of those provinces–Jack Layton and the NDP are proposing to eliminate the 5% federal portion of the harmoized sales tax inorder to offset the Harper/McGuinty/Campbell incease by as much as possible.

What, exactly, is dishonest about that?

Dot

As part of Stephen Harper's push to get the provinces to adopt the HST, Dalton McGuinty and Gordon Campbell did

Provincial jurisdiction. Duh.

Reverend_Blair

I don't think you understand, Dot. As part of the HST deal that Harper gave to BC and Ontario, they had to begin taxing things that previously had GST but not PST on them. It is very much the deal that Harper offered the provinces that caused the rates to go up.

Dot

As part of the HST deal that Harper gave to BC and Ontario, they had to begin taxing things that previously had GST but not PST on them

Provinces always had the option of merging their provincial tax with the fed GST since its inception, 20 ish yrs ago. In fact, many provinces already had. True, Harper may be rightly criticized for bribing the provinces, for doing something that should have been done yrs ago, but the final decision was the premiers'. And they are the ones to be held accountable, if necessary, by their electorate – such as Gordon Campbell in BC. Wrongly, I'd argue, but I don't live in BC, so my opinion matters just about s much as SH's does on this issue.

http://nottawa.blogspot.com Mark

"That caused the price of home heating and utilities to go up 7 to 8%"

Not true. Now that the companies who sell gas, oil, electricity, etc. can claim input credits for everything they purchase in developing and transporting their final product, the price of all of these commodities has fallen, prior to the tax being added. So while it is true that tax is 8% higher than before, the total cost isn't 8% higher.

Dot

Splitting hairs. Not sure its true either – cost of energy is a flow through to consumers.
kcm

Mark: Do you have any evidence/figures to back that up? I know that's the theory, but so far [ in BC at least] there hasn't been any sign of input costs being passed on to consumers. All everyone sees is costs/prices going up.

Dot

You have to be careful in the q you're asking regarding regulated energy (electricity, nat gas), and the fuller basket of goods, freely traded.
kcm

Thanks. Like most consumers i don't pretend to understand the intricacies of how the energy market operates. All i know is costs are going up and my available income isn't – and yet i don't want to be party to pplicies that increase unecessarily our/my use of energy – particularly dirty energy.

Jan

Well, in B.C. there was never PST on hydro. What is now showing on our bills is a 12% HST charge followed by a provincial instant 7% rebate. So the amount of tax remains the same. Bottom line, the HST hasn't changed the amount of tax being paid on hydro in BC. I will check natural gas and heating oil tomorrow.

Orson Bean

It's Stephen Harper's HST because Stephen Harper is the (negative) target of the ad. It's not Gordie Campbell's or Dalton McGuinty's HST because they aren't the target of the ad.

Emily

Govt by bandaid…gawd I hate this stuff.

Dot

Someone should take this ad and run a 3 way split screen.-Jack Layton on the left with the snowy field background; Mike Duffy with the rolled up paper in his hand on the right; and that Microsoft Office talking paper clip helper in the middle.

Emily

LOL I wouldn't know what to fire my elastic slingshot at first!

Mike T.

They should put him in a coat when the background changes to the snowy farmhouse.

Jan

One of those barn jackets on, maybe have him holding a long gun…the Americans know how to lay this on better.

Mike T.

And on a horse. Which he gives a name to. And the gun should have "Registered and proud" engraved on it!

http://canadiansense.blogspot.com/ CanadianSense

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzweVAachUI&fe…
Sorry Jack you want to raise our home heating bills by more than 5% with your Carbon Tax Plan,
[youtube GzweVAachUI&feature=channel http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzweVAachUI&feature=channel youtube]

RayK

Carbon Tax?

That's the Liberals, not the NDP.

http://canadiansense.blogspot.com/ CanadianSense

Layton wants us to meet Kyoto targets through making big polluters pays? This is a redistribution of wealth.
The Global Bank Tax (Robin Hood Tax) the 35% increase to employers and employees, I could go on.

http://nottawa.blogspot.com Mark

The federal government has no record of how people heat their homes, and no way of knowing whether a gas bill is used for heat or for the barbecue, or a hydro bill for heating a home or warming the jacuzzi. Short of creating a heat-source registry, or some similar new bureaucracy, there is absolutely no way for the federal government to determine or refund anyone's HST on heat.

But will anyone in the Press Gallery ask Jack the very simple question of 'how'? Not bloody likely.

Orson Bean

Very true that NDP proposals often don't get the kind of scrutiny that Tory or Liberal ones do, for the reason that they're not likely to form government.

Mike514

I think you meant: for the reason that no one takes them seriously.

Jan

Is it any worse than Harper's 'Choice in Childcare' cheques?

Emily

No, it's the same piece-meal bandaid stuff

Jan

Meanwhile, there is an elephant in the room nobody wants to talk about – the deficit.

Emily

No….it's something never mentioned when they're tossing around figures for fighterplanes and prisons.

Like it mysteriously vanished.
Orson Bean

And another possible elephant in the room — the fact that our housing market has been a huge driver of our economy, this is not sustainable and we are likely to see that market — and all of its spinoffs — be considerably soft over the next couple of years. (cf. article in the Globe Report on Business over the weekend on this)

Jake

Wow what a bad commercial. With the house in the background and the 5% graphic I feel like he's pedaling discount mortgages or something like that.
Anon Liberal

No problem Jack. We'll just set our kitchen tables on fire.
Philanthropist

Jack accomplished nothing in Toronto where he was a politician for years. He made appeals to special interest groups all the time, it got him re-elected, but if had advocated rational adult policy – instead of 'stealing-other-people's-money' policy – more people would have a higher standard of living right now.
Everyone knows the government cannot raise the standard of living, through taxation, they always lower it. But that does provide socialists with a group of voters they own and control, it's what the corrupt Liberals do all the time.

Emily

LOL you're hilarious.

Have you ever looked into stand-up as a career?

Orson Bean

Just saw the BC-specific version of this — for everyone who lives in the Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island, that bleak, freezing cold and snowbound farmhouse isn't exactly going to resonate. For most people on the Lower Mainland & the Island, their biggest concern in winter is keeping the water at bay from the rain. Jack would have been better off promising a tax break for the cost removing toxic mould and mushrooms.
TwoYen

I can never understand how the NDP can say it supports the measures to loweer GHGs on the one hand and then turn around and repeatedly advocate policies aimed at lowering heating costs and gasoline costs. They can't have it both ways. Either you support measures to lower GHG emissions or you don't. The NDP is consistent at least. It doesn't.

DerekPearce

Exactly. They want to appeal to those concerned about the environment, but then also be the party of the average workin' joe at the same time. All the while pretending to be more principled than the other two federal parties. Somethings gotta give.

TwoYen

Yes, at least Stephane Dion was honest. He was willing to pay the political price for adopting green policies. It may have been poor politics but he had integrity. I'll give him that much.

Claudia Lemire

He has, I really admire him, I still don't think he has a political backbone but a very smart and a good guy!

Orson Bean

A classic example of what you're talking about is the (some would say bizarre) behaviour of the BC NDP over the last few years. Gordon Campbell proposed and implemented a carbon tax, and the NDP staunchly opposed it. The reasons:

1. The knee-jerk reaction of the NDP, as an opposition party, that has it automatically oppose anything the govt does; and

2. As the OP notes, the attraction the NDP has towards supporting any position that seems to resonate with the "average joe."

HopeSo

So…increase tax on those who produce energy, but decrease tax on those who use energy. Solid economics….

Orson Bean

Well, you see, the producers are evil, while the consumers are good.

Bob

Jack's a good guy, but this – like most of his political ads – yet again makes him come across as a used car salesman.
Curt

Just let global warming do its thing.Problem solved.
LaxAtlDfwYow

Lousy economics. Lame visuals. Good politics.
Emily

If you think global warming is going to solve any of this, you don't understand global warming.
Dave

Used cars? I thought he was trying to sell me Old Spice, until the expected whistling bit at the end failed to appear.